I know this seems a bit of an odd topic, but a good friend of mine was grousing the other day about police cruisers flying down the road without sirens or lights and saying how they were setting a bad example by breaking the law themselves. I have said just the same things many times myself but this time I defended police officers for their fast driving.
What brought about this change? Simply that I have done ride alongs now and see how things work from the police side of the matter. Unfortunately, very few citizens ever have this opportunity and never get the scoop. For some reason, there is nothing ever explained to the public about this practice and one can go all their life and never have a clue to the simple answer.
Here it is.
When a carjacking or a violent crime is going down or an officer is in trouble, cops fly from all directions, lights flashing and sirens blaring, because they need to get to the scene of the crime in as short a time as is possible. Lives depend on the police arriving and intervening and so, everyone get out of the way, it is a major emergency.
But, the during the rest of the shift, the calls are more in a gray area. Something may be going down and one wants to get there as quickly as possible without making a federal case out of it. Also, sometimes there are so many calls, shaving time off getting to them allows the police to handle more concerns.
And, imagine this, if every time a police officer was responding to a call he put on his police sirens and lights, we would be living in a pretty scary and noisy place! Can you imagine the complaints this would cause?
So, citizens, this is why police speed. Don't you wonder why you never knew this before? Strange, isn't it?
Criminal Profiler Pat Brown
What brought about this change? Simply that I have done ride alongs now and see how things work from the police side of the matter. Unfortunately, very few citizens ever have this opportunity and never get the scoop. For some reason, there is nothing ever explained to the public about this practice and one can go all their life and never have a clue to the simple answer.
Here it is.
When a carjacking or a violent crime is going down or an officer is in trouble, cops fly from all directions, lights flashing and sirens blaring, because they need to get to the scene of the crime in as short a time as is possible. Lives depend on the police arriving and intervening and so, everyone get out of the way, it is a major emergency.
But, the during the rest of the shift, the calls are more in a gray area. Something may be going down and one wants to get there as quickly as possible without making a federal case out of it. Also, sometimes there are so many calls, shaving time off getting to them allows the police to handle more concerns.
And, imagine this, if every time a police officer was responding to a call he put on his police sirens and lights, we would be living in a pretty scary and noisy place! Can you imagine the complaints this would cause?
So, citizens, this is why police speed. Don't you wonder why you never knew this before? Strange, isn't it?
Criminal Profiler Pat Brown
By all means, we do NOT want to hamper the police's ability to get to a call fast. There are people trying to get it stopped and police chases stopped, and I just think that's ridiculous.
ReplyDeleteOne other thing: I used, in my youth, to ride motorcycle escort, police bikes, uniform, beacon, whistle - but as a civilian for funerals and some VIP escort (usually real police). We were allowed to speed and drive on whatever side of the road suited our fancy because we had to leap-frog ahead of the motorcade to stop traffic and sometimes had to double back for some reason. It was FUN, but dangerous in this trafficky town.